Living The Dream

“So how’s life in Argentina? Amazing I bet..” “Are you going to stay forever?”

You hear these from friends back home constantly. There seems to be something about living abroad that they just don’t get. You are fairly sure that the majority of your British peers imagine that you are “living the dream”.  They think that you don’t work, or that if you do, it’s not “real work”, that you spend your days having and drinking sex on the beach (the idea that it’s ever cold doesn’t seem to occur to them, nor does the small detail that the closest thing Buenos Aires has to a beach is a dirty brown river). You dance tango, eat steak every night and occasionally have exciting yet brief flings with Gael Garcia Bernal lookalikes who woo you with their Spanish words whilst spinning you round in various exotic locations.

That idea does sound lovely, and is probably the kind of thing some of the more fortunate visitors to Buenos Aires might experience (in between being mugged, stepping on dog shit and warding off the incomprehensible cat calls of old men). In truth, the reality of “living the dream” is quite different.

Myth One: Life Abroad is One Long Holiday.

Last year you had two weeks off for the winter holidays in July. This idea appeared too much for many to fathom. Firstly, winter in July?

So it’s like…winter there now?                                      

 Yes.

They nod at you and feign what they hope is a look of understanding but their failure to grasp the two hemisphere concept is all too apparent from the dazed look in their eyes.  

Whilst discussing your excitement and need for said winter break, your friend at home comments that you are “always on holiday”. This, is simply not true. You work as hard, let’s be honest – harder than you ever did in England.

What?                                                                           

I hear you cry,

I thought Latin life was chilled out and everything was left hasta mañana.

The thing is life anywhere tends to be hasta mañana when you’re on holiday (did you mention you weren’t?)- unless you’re one of those adventuring types who spend all day writing itineraries for how to fit in climbing that volcano and having an authentic bear wrestling experience whilst updating your facebook status.

Yes the weather’s nicer but when you’re working in classrooms saturated with the leftover odour of the last groups’ teenage hormones life doesn’t seem quite so idyllic.  Equally, when you’re eating a Christmas dinner of chicken sandwiches and potato salad (apparent Argentine tradition) with no tree, let alone presents it feels more like you’re living the life of a lonely idiot rather than that of a clever dreamer.

Pause to consider that not only is Christmas shit and celebrated a day early but you also get the wrong days off at Easter and are missing out on any royally related bank holidays.

Here there are so many bank holidays that they become more of a hindrance than a cause for festivity. Whilst celebrating what seems like the tenth National Pride Day you are left starving, unable to leave the city, all modes of transport have been booked up for months. You have an empty fridge and are unable to purchase anything but flags (I’m sure Argentina would still be in G8 had they not blown all their money on copious amounts of nationalist paraphernalia).

You are so accustomed to holidays in general, wrong day or not, that you find it quite appalling that you are expected to work a whole month without a long weekend. This almost never happens, and even if does you get at least one day off for some nonsense like a national census where you are ordered to stay indoors to be counted.

You begin to get the feeling you are arguing against your own point. Best to move on.

Myth Two: Latin Love Affairs

Since moving to South America, the number of Latin lovers who have attempted to woo you has been limited to those who want to practice their English or talk about The Beatles (who you used to like before you moved here). Even they lose interest once they suffer your tango or salsa moves. Those that survive the dancing will usually then go on to bludgeon you into a coma with their lengthy cliché ridden monologues about your eyes, hair, accent or any other feature that happens to be visible at the time. Particularly problematic is that you soon tire of the “how England is different to here” conversation and have no desire to talk about your feelings, football or meet anyone’s entire extended family.

In the same way that British compatriots back home enjoy indulging in the fantasy of life abroad, Latin men seem to have similar unrealistic ideals about going out with a European. They imagine educated, glamorous beauties will whisk them away to a modern wonderland where the streets are paved with ipads and it rains money on Wednesdays.

In reality, it usually rains actual water more than once a week, and anyone who is here probably cannot afford to leave. Those who do manage to scrimp enough for the flight home are consequently so broke they cannot buy even a half price Walkman let alone an ipad.

Myth Three:  Once you move abroad you have two options:  Come Home or Stay Forever

English people, when asking about the future, seem to understand only two time scales: now and forever. They ask you if you are staying abroad forever, and when you say that you don’t know, you’ll just see how it goes, they look at you like you have officially gone mad.

But what’s the plan? They want to know. Haven’t you worked out and laminated a year by year flow-diagram-life-plan whereby you spend your days slaving away in a job you don’t like, get a mortgage and a husband and throw a few kids in for good measure? All because that’s what everyone else is doing and you really do feel like somehow you should be too.

People here also constantly ask you the same questions:

How long have you been here?

Over a year

Do you like it?  You reply that you do, they either look at you like you’re deluded for having left behind the ipad lined pavements or puff out their chests and glow with national pride (whilst smoothing out their flag).

They also ask you how long you are planning on staying. When you say that you don’t know they smile, like they understand, and shrug their shoulders (or, more likely, do the more local gesture for “I don’t know” involving a hand movement from chin to mid-air)

That’s what you like about life abroad, the absence of a plan is acceptable. Just like it’s totally acceptable to spend your entire Sunday drinking mate in the park and have fifteen national holidays a year for no particular reason.

The biggest myth for you, is why everyone else stayed at home.

Why nuts should be banned

When less than a couple of hundred got mad cow disease, the nation stopped eating beef. When swine flu caused roughly 4% of annual influenza deaths crowds of panicked people wore useless face masks for weeks on end. When foot and mouth hit Britain, over 10 million livestock were killed to curb the spread of the disease.

In such situations, moral panics sweep the nation so that within days people become terrified about the possibility of such horrors. The world is gripped with fear, reports of fatalities and even cases are reported across the planet, maps are drawn up to see how these monstrosities have spread, people everywhere call their doctors in a panic because they become convinced their runny nose is a sure sign of their impending death.

When thousands of people across the planet are known to be so allergic to foods that merely being in the same room as them can kill them, nothing happens.

Why is it then, that allergies, which arguably are much more dangerous than any of these diseases (they can occur at any time and cause the victim nasty often fatal reactions which become increasingly severe) do not cause similar hysteria. I am aware that Britain, for example, is a country which is extremely “aware” of the threat that allergies can cause. Companies are so “aware” in fact that they even bother to write on a stick of wrapped celery that it “may contain traces of nuts”. What exactly does “may contain traces of nuts” mean? That the same factory that packs celery also packs nuts? That they pack it on the same line? That nut fumes from a factory down the road may accidentally leak into said celery because they share a delivery truck? Or is that they are so terrified of being sued that they write it on every label they produce?

This over-enthusiastic labelling, disguised as a help, actually hinders the allergy sufferer. If they choose to follow such warnings they can eat practically nothing. There is very little on the supermarket shelves of England these days which does not carry such warnings. Last time I checked, natural yoghurt “may contain traces”. Ranges of nut-free products are increasing, but tend to be limited to confectionary. It’s all very well being able to eat a bar of chocolate made in a nut-free zone but if you can’t eat an apple for fear of contamination life becomes rather difficult.

Instead, the savvy allergic one chooses to ignore such advice, this is fine if one assumes that the companies are indeed lying, but what if a product actually does contain a trace of nut and one day causes a reaction? Then what do you do? Assuming that you survive such an attack should you then avoid everything and create your own nut-free zone home where you live in quarantine and anyone that enters must be screened for traces and washed in a special nut-free soap?

Another particularly tricky problem is the issue that those severely allergic could have a reaction just from swopping saliva with someone who’s been eating nuts. Does this mean that sufferers should enquire about the dietary habits of those they are about to kiss? This
could potentially be somewhat of a passion killer.  Might the allergy extend to a shared toothbrush? That could be a tricky morning-after situation; you try to leave discreetly yet brush your teeth before you escape in an attempt to cleanse yourself of the night before. Your host ate nuts the day before yesterday; traces still linger not on their breath but on their bristles. There’s one thing worse than a walk of shame and that’s a trip to A&E.

In Western society, health and safety laws have become so absurd that you practically have to fill out a risk assessment to leave the house. If one toy is found to be faulty, causing the death of one child the whole batch is recalled and parents everywhere are outraged, broadcasting their plight in the school playground, the papers and even on TV.

Nuts, cause thousands of deaths each year, and the number of cases of anaphylaxis costs the NHS thousands, if not millions of pounds a year. That’s without considering the cost of issuing each allergic person their own epi-pen. These pens costs £36 each, most sufferers carry two, and according to the label go out of date each year so each sufferer, reaction or not, costs at least £72 a year.

Do not despair, for I have answer to this problem. Over-zealous labelling is not what we need, nor is a “miracle cure” for the allergy which, quite frankly I don’t know how they propose to test. I most certainly would not be willing to participate in a medical trial where people feed me nuts to see what happens.  No, the answer is more simple. If the toy is faulty and someone dies, you don’t stock it. If swine flu’s about, you try and stop it spreading. If there’s mad cow disease you don’t eat beef. If someone falls over at the train station and breaks a leg, you employ an extra “health and safety officer” and pay them thousands a year to put up pointless signs telling people to be careful.  If 1 in a 100 in the
UK has a fatal peanut allergy and 1 in 200 has a tree nut allergy, everyone should simply stop eating nuts. Lives are saved, people with nut allergys no longer have to play russian roulette everytime they eat, the NHS saves money, millions isn’t wasted on ridiculous labelling, factories don’t have to control the spread of nuts, no one gets sued. Can you argue with that Mr Cameron?

Mugging

Three weeks ago, I got mugged. Don’t be horrified and imagine a rough gang emerging from a bush to beat me up at gun point in a desperate bid for everything I own. The entire experience was a disconcerting one for a number of reasons but as muggings go, fairly tame.

I was walking, in a customary Sunday afternoon hung over and sleep deprived state, through the suburb of San Telmo. We were on our way to the nature reserve to lie in the sun. I had just broken my 10 peso note for a carton of juice and was strolling along, dozily sipping. Opposite, there was a football match going on, and someone had parked a car on the side of the road which was blaring out loud salsa music. I had just about taken in my surroundings, for this was a part of town I’d not been to before (nor do I feel inclined to return), when all of a sudden I looked up to find two boys in my path.

They looked rough as hell, one of them looked like he had recently been in a fight and they both had the hard, unkind faces of people you most definitely wouldn’t want to invite round for tea. Before I knew it, the uglier, rougher of the two (though it was a close call) had advanced upon me, like a particularly nasty animal closing in on its prey, so that I was against the wall of a building. When his face was so close I could smell his breath, he said: “dame tu cartera”

This was a confusing request. Cartera means purse or bag, what exactly was it he wanted? All that flashed through my head was: “Am I being mugged?!” but not being entirely sure if that was what was happening, I asked for clarification: “que?”. He asked again, more insistent this time and playing with his trousers, opening and closing his jogging bottoms in a way which I can only assume was supposed to make me think he was hiding something sinister.

He wasn’t actually showing me anything though, so I felt it disinclined to give him my stuff without a fight. This boy was only about 17, it was embarrassing! I said “no”, clutching my bag.

This clearly wasn’t quite the reaction he’d hoped for. I’m pretty sure he thought I’d be an easy target. In fact, he seemed unsure what to do, his friend didn’t offer him any advice or backup and so he resorted to swearing at me, (I didn’t fully understand his particularly grotesque insults, but I gather they were some reference  to my mother and her female parts). I remained undeterred, and for a moment it looked like they were just going to go away.

I looked to my boyfriend for help. Yes, he was there, though it looked like it was just an exchange between mugger one and I whilst Gary and mugger two were simply passing the time on the street together. They could’ve been doing anything; waiting for the bus, having a chat, talking about the weather. It felt like we were in some kind of weird slow motion film that was pausing for an ad break. We’d already established I wasn’t going to give mugger one the bag, and no-one seemed about to stab me, so what next?

My plea for help got me the advice of “give them the bag Rosie”. I was thinking of my epipen, wondering whether to give them my purse and phone, knowing that my anti-nut injection was more valuable than anything else. Whilst I pondered this dilemma, and two muggers and a boyfriend awaited my decision, mugger two got bored and demanded that mugger one get on with it. Eventually my bag was grabbed, its strap broke and both muggers ran away, taking what they wanted and chucking my bag with my keys in it on the corner.

They definitely weren’t professionals, clearly thinking that all my money would be in my purse, they didn’t bother to look in the pocket of my discarded bag, where 5 lonely pesos was sitting, probably pleased with itself for staying in cleaner hands.

This incident was a weird one, particularly because it took place in the middle of the day, and brought up a number of questions for me. What should I do in that kind of situation? Is it better to give muggers what they want? I mean, I didn’t know that they weren’t about to pull a knife out of their bag or punch me in the eye for not cooperating (I had a job interview the next day so that really would’ve been a slap in the face). Should my boyfriend have done the “manly” thing and saved me? Should I have run away? Chucked my purse on the floor and bolted in the opposite direction? Was it my fault for not spotting them earlier? Was I stupid to be carrying a bag in the first place?

For a while after this incident, I was scared to walk around alone, and felt my heart beat faster anytime a stranger came near me. But these things wear off, and life continues much the same. The only change is that I bought a new, even crappier phone. I also go out without my bag, my valuables are now stored on various parts of my body. Money and key without its key rings, live in my deepest pockets. A new (very expensive) adrenaline injection lurks in my boot, knocking my leg as a constant reminder of both its life saving ability and very irritating shape. Just in case.

Elections

Before I arrived in Bolivia, I knew little about the country, and even less about it´s politics. I´d heard that the president, Evo Morales had refused to sell the lithium under the salt flats to a multinational in America, saying that if Bolivia was going to sell it, they would do it in a way that would benefit Bolivian people. I thought he sounded like a pretty decent bloke from this small nugget of information, plus he has a chubby likeable face and looks a little bit like a teddy bear. However, after spending almost 4 months here, and with the elections coming up at the end of this week I´ve begun to understand there´s a lot more to Evo than his cuddly exterior. And it´s not pretty.

First of all, lets assess his credentials, he did not graduate from high schoool. Now I don´t want to be one to judge too quickly, perhaps what he lacks in education he makes up for in life experience. I have heard various things about what he has done since becoming president. A couple of them have been good.

Evo is big on indigenous rights, and there are a lot of indigenous people here. I hear that Evo has greatly improved literacy rates in Bolivia, mostly for this indigenous population.  I can´t knock that. He also wants everyone to speak their languages, Quechua and Aymara. In fact, he has made it law that all companies have to teach their employees Quechua and Aymara, and if not they may be shut down. Incidentally, Evo himself does not speak either.

Not only is he tough on getting people to learn languages, he´s tough on getting votes. Quite literally. He does things like moving groups of his supporters to places with temperatures of 80 degrees C in the middle of nowhere so he can receive votes in that area. Apparantly it´s not quite so important that the children then die of dehydration or  diarrhoea and contract diseases from the unfamiliar territory. In fact he is so keen on getting people to vote that he does not stop there. He once sent a group of his fans from the mountains to an indigenous community to spread the Evo love. Unfortunately what happened was not so much love but war, the two communities did not get on and one day there was a push, which turned into a shove, which turned into a scuffle, which turned into  Evo´s men taking out guns and shooting dead 20 people. He doesn´t write that on his election leaflets. Now I understand why a lot of the graffiti says ¨Evo asesino¨.  Asesino meaning assasin. ´

It´s not just this graffiti that I´ve noticed in the past few weeks, every weekend thousands of people take to the streets to campaign for the election. There are marches, banners and plenty of shouting. All the public transport is adorned by support for whichever political party (mostly Evo) and is all completely full as there are so many people around.

I originally thought that this must mean that people are really into politics here, on remarking on this to my housemate, she told me that if those who work in the public sector don´t go to the streets and support Evo, they lose a weeks salary. I couldn´t believe it, and her story got worse, her son is a lawyer who used to work for a private firm. His boss supported the head of the court, a man called Fernando who Evo didn´t like, therefore he closed the whole firm and everyone lost their jobs. Hence her son´s now obligitory  Saturday street shouting.

As you can probably imagine, all this does not help Evo´s popularity, at least unofficially and nor has he made himself popular with other countries. He nationalised the energy companies here when he promised Spain he wouldn´t. Spain had promised him that they would wipe Bolivia´s debt. Needless to say I´m pretty sure the debt was back pretty quickly once they realised what he´d done. He also refused to sell gas to Brazil and Chile, who now buy and sell successfully elsewhere, this seems like a massive missed opportunity for Bolivia´s economy.

Evo´s biggest hate however, is the US, he  does not want them in his country, and has tripled the cost of Americans getting work visas here. But his hatred towards the States stretches further than to just the Americans, if a Bolivian chooses to work for the US, they can never again work for the pubic sector here (I´m sure they´ll be devastated to miss out on all that shouting). He also shut down USAid who do a lot of work here because he believed that they were funding the opposition, when they were doing nothing but encouraging political involvement.  Enemies, he has plenty, and to his friends he owes money. So much in fact that if Venezuela goes to war then Bolivia will probably go too, as they owe Chaves so much money.

However, all signs predict that he will win this week. By all signs I mean that he has fixed the voting machines that way.

This appears to be common knowledge, several people have told me this. Yet they do nothing, and feel like there is little they can do. When all the evidence is gathered it does seem like me and the people here are living in some sort of dictatorship. I wonder how much further he can take it, and how much longer the people will put up with it.

Saying that I don´t  think that everyone hates him, a friend said he was necessary for the current time in Bolivia but that he didn´t like him. Plus, I´ve done few interviews with the indigenous population, I don´t tend to talk politics whilst buying my juice in a bag from a cholita. Most of the people I´ve spoken to are fairly well educated people. Perhaps there is another side to the story, one I am unaware of. Fingers crossed it´s a good one.

One more thing I forgot to mention, Evo put the oppositions vice president in prison for slander. And there I was thinking I was living in the 21st century.

At least there is one ray of hope for Bolivia, the law is that after 2 terms of presidency, you´re out. At least at the moment this is the law, I´ve heard that if elected again Evo has plans to change this, and who knows what else he is hatching.

I´ll keep you posted.

Not my day

On Saturday night I went to a rave in the mountains.  I got wasted, I danced all night and I walked home at 5am with aching feet.

That was a lie. That´s what people are supposed to do at raves, but not me.

I couldn´t drink, ´cos I´m still on antibiotics, the music was lame, and I ended up going home in a taxi on my own with no company but a bandaged foot and a broken camera.

I should´ve known the evening was doomed. Let me describe my day and I think you´ll begin to understand.

That day I was wearing ballet shoes, which have zero grip and are utterly impractical, but do look very cute, plus I´d sewed on pink ribbons to make them even more so. I was carrying my cup of tea down the stairs in the morning when I slipped, and ended up falling down about 5 steps, bashing one hip against the bannister and landing awkwardly on the other. I also spilt my tea all over myself and the stairs. There was no one at home, no one to hear me fall. I therefore had no choice but to pick myself up and hobble down the rest of the stairs. That was injury no 1, which resulted in several black bruises. And I had to make a new cup of tea.

Later on that day, I got a call from my boyfriend saying he was in town and did I want to meet him to go to the jaccuzi together.

I gathered my things and got the first trufi (shared taxi) I could into town. I arrived at the arranged meeting place to find no boyfriend in sight; all that happened was that I got wolf whistled at and hassled by various people trying to sell me stuff and shine my shoes. Eventually, Gary arrived and we made our way to the hotel.

We paid our 40Bs each, having just enough the right amount and not a penny to spare between us. I wasn´t sure how we were gonna get home but decided to think about that later. We headed to the 4th floor and found a beautiful pool and jaccuzi in a glass room, heated by the sun and with a stunning view of La Paz. There was also a sauna, hot bath and some luxurious changing rooms. We even got our own soft white towels.

It was heaven. I hadn´t done anything so posh for a long time, and it cost the grand total of 4 quid! Excellent! Unfortunately, I made two mistakes whilst at the spa. One, I looked at myself in a full length mirror for the first time in two months, in a bikini. Two, I got in the jacuzzi. Firstly, I had put on weight. How the hell I had managed that? Everyone who comes to La Paz sheds pounds like snakes shed skin and I´d originally lost weight when I got here. How had I managed to put that weight on plus more?!

I thought about it, I guess it could be the fact that I´d barely walked anywhere in the past month ´cos I´d been too ill and tired. Or perhaps it´s was all that ice cream I ate (we live next door to a factory what´s a girl to do?!) or maybe it´s all those sweets and crisps I’d been scoffing in my breaks. Or all that white chocolate, or the recent obsession with mashed potato. Damnit. I was lucky I wasn´t a whale. I was gonna have to  do that dreaded thing that fat people do….go on a diet. Eek.

I went to meet Gary in the pool and announced this fact to him. I moaned for a while till he got sick of me and declared that I was ¨not fat¨(how sweet of him, he won some points here) ¨just podgy¨(what a bastard, he´d lost them all).  I was horrified, it was one thing for me to think I´d put on weight let alone have someone declare me to be podgy. He said it was ¨cute¨. I almost hit him, in fact I think I did hit him.

I spent the next hour looking at other women wondering if I was fatter than them. Oh God. I was turning into one of ¨those women¨, obsessive and dull. I tried to forget about it and we switched to the jaccuzi. My second mistake. After a relaxing 15 minutes or so I decided I wanted to sit on the bottom of it. As you probably know, most holes in jaccuzis blow out water, but this one appeared to be sucking it in. It proved this by suddenly sucking in both the back of my bikini bottoms and the skin above them. I yelped and managed to free myself, I now had a big red mark, on the same side that I´d bashed earlier. Excellent. I´d actually managed to injure myself in a place specifically designed for relaxation.

Later on, some friends came round as there were plans to go to a rave together. We had coffee (Irish for them, normal for me) before we prepared to leave. I told them I was angry at Gary for calling me fat (he denied using the “F” word). We were just about to leave so I changed into my favourite red dress and went into my housemate´s (a Bolivian tupperware lady) room to look in her mirror. She asked me why I was wearing my leggings so low and said they were cutting me in half. She was right so I pulled them up. She then commented that I´d got fatter. I thought my now paranoid head had mistranslated and said..¨¿que?¨ she repeated what she´d said and I hadn´t misheard or translated. I walked out without saying a word.

Needless to say I was not in the best mood when we left, I told Lourdes that I was angry at her and she said ¨pero es la verdad¨ (but it´s the truth). I told her she didn´t have to say so and she laughed at me. Bitch. We got a taxi there and I got in the front seat while the other 4 sat in the back, Martin commented that the fat girl was in the front. He was joking. I was not amused. I knew I wasn´t really fat, but if that was the case then why was everyone saying I was?!

We got to the rave and surprise surprise, the good old disorganised Bolivians had no light and no system. We had to wait in the queue for ages for the ticket office to even open.

It was in a football stadium, and there were 3 poorly erected tents and various other stalls, the music was alright, and it was not unlike any other rave in any other country. I thought back to the last one I´d been to in Serbia, where my friend had broken her leg. Well at least that isn´t gonna happen I thought. I wasn´t completely wrong.

I was taking some pictures of us doing stupid dance moves when my camera made a funny popping sound and ceased to work. I couldn´t revive it even with duracell batteries, oh dear.

It was quite  a young crowd and I felt like a bit of a grandma as I found myself surrounded by giggling teenage girls. We danced for a while, then went to investigate the chewing gum lady, a girl who stood in a green glowing booth which smelled of chewing gum and gave you a random spiel about the gum before giving you a free sample. It was weird. They didn´t have that in Serbia.

We went to get drinks and I was forced to have a beer as it was cheaper than the other option, red bull. We then went on the bouncy castle, which had  a climbing wall up the side of it and a rope to help you up. I couldn´t get up to the top of the wall, and slid backwards down the slidey bit of the castle. I spilt my beer everywhere and was soaking wet with my own drink for the second time that day. I gave up on being adventurous and sat back against the wall of the castle to watch everyone else climbing up. A girl was infront of me trying to get up, she fell, onto me. Her foot dug into mine leaving a mark and I felt a familiar feeling of pain. I´d done it again. I´d torn a ligament in my right foot 4 times previously and of course, it was my right foot she had fallen on.

The world started to spin and I couldn´t get up or out as there were too many people in the way. Eventually I launched myself through a gap in the wall and landed on the grass, trying to blink back tears. I was helped up by my friends and hobbled my way to the medical  tent, though I knew there was nothing they could do except give me some deep heat. Deep heat is good though, so off I went.I went in and could see in the light that my foot was swollen and marked. I wished that I had been in England, where you have to take off your shoes before you get on a bouncy castle and there´s someone next to it with a whistle. There of course, were no whistles and no line of shoes by the side of castle, there hadn´t even been anyone watching.

Once inside the tent, I got an anti-inflammatory pill, some deep heat and a bandage. I hobbled out and assessed the situation, I had to go home. I assumed that Gary would come home with me but he wanted to stay and didn´t seem to get that a rave when you can barely walk, let alone dance is not so fun. He got me a taxi and gave me the money and I went home alone, dejected. I was mad at him and locked my door so he couldn´t get in.

The next day, luckily, things didn´t seem quite as hopeless as the day before. The jaccuzi mark had gone down, though the stair fall had left a big black bruise. My foot hurt, and was still swollen, but I knew I hadn´t torn anything as the pain was not as bad as it has been previously.  I did ache a bit in general, but I think that was just from swimming, which I hadn´t done in ages. Gary felt bad for not coming home with me, so shouted me lunch at a yummy mexican restaurant (I didn´t eat it all, and I didn´t have pudding, diets going well so far!). Then we went to my first football match, Bolivia vs. Brazil, and Bolivia won! So all in all Sunday was a good day. It was a bit like the day after a hangover when you´re just happy to wake up feeling normal, plus there was the whole seeing Brazil play, and get beaten, that part was pretty fun. I don´t quite know how I managed to be so incredibly clumsy in one day though, lets hope that´s all the clumsiness gone out of me for the year, or at least for the next week or so until I´ve recovered from the injuries of that fated Saturday.

The hairdressers

On my first full day in Bolivia, whilst chatting with the woman I lived with, I casually mentioned that I needed my hair cut. I hadn´t got round to getting it done before I left England, and could barely see past my fringe. She smiled and said that she was planning to go to the hairdresser that day, and why didn´t I join her.

I agreed, though I was slightly worried about the quality of haircut I would receive. Her hair looked pretty good though so I figured it couldn´t be that bad, and so that evening we walked together after work to her hairdressers, not far away.

The salon was in the rich part of town, but had quite a shabby appearance. There was one sink, full of products and a hairdryer or two (they´re not so big on health and safety here), a slighly larger than normal Bolivian woman greeted us with a kiss on the cheek and told us to take a seat. She was currently cutting someone else´s hair. Another woman was getting her nails done next to us and a young girl of about 10 was sat beside her, painting her own nails.

I could tell this was a place where gossip was harboured and men were to be talked about but not seen. There was a TV in the corner of the room showing some kind of Spanish game show.

I took a seat and didn´t have to wait long until it was my turn. I got up, sat in the chair and mimed a little off my fringe and the ends and stated ¨solo un poquito¨- just a little bit, ¨por favor¨. The woman promoptly set to work, chatting to me and the other women in Spanish as she did so.

She did not wash my hair but sprayed it with water until I resembled a drowned rat. I should´ve known this was not going to go well at that point, everyone knows you should never cut a fringe when it´s wet or you will end up with it halfway up your forehead. The woman, lets called her Betty, began to untangle the birds nest on my head, I´d lost my luggage and hadn´t been able to brush my hair in about 4 days, the poor woman did have a job on her hands. She began to cut and I watched in dismay as much more than ¨un poquito¨ of my hair was hacked off and lay looking up at me from the lino floor. Of course, by this point it was too late to say anything and anyway I didn´t know the Spanish for ¨you are ruining my hair you crazy woman!¨- (well, not quite, I was lacking the verb ¨to ruin¨).

I crossed my fingers for my fringe´s health and was tempted to close my eyes but felt too rude. Betty continued to question me on where I was from etc and complimented me on my Spanish. I warmed to her very slightly.

That was until she began to attack my fringe, yes that´s right, attack it. In fact it´s quite difficult to relive this experience, and I only can now without squirming because it is now a month later and my hair seems to have just about recovered. But know one thing..it was much much shorter than I´d hoped for, and asked for. I began to imagine being laughed at on the streets and stared at even more than normal.

I thought the ordeal was over, surely there was nothing more that could possibly go wrong, but Betty began to hack into the sides of my hair giving me a Jennifer-Aniston-in-very-early-Friends look, when feathering was all the rage, and proceeded to dry my hair with a round brush, completing the 90s throwback look.

She stepped back to proudly examine her work and asked my what I thought. I was inwardly horrified but managed to be outwardly grateful, I didn´t want to offend anyone on my first day on the continent. I was thinking I´d simply have to avoid mirrors, photos and possibly all human life until it grew back. I wondered if anyone had invented fringe extensions yet.

I took a short walk to shame back to my previous seat whilst the woman I lived with took her turn in the torture chair. Somehow, she managed to escape unscathed, and her hair looked as nice as ever. Perhaps this was some kind of test, inaguration or punishment for foreigners.

Lost in such thoughts, I barely noticed the little girl sat next to me. Eventually I realised she was alternating between staring at me, her newly painted nails and flicking channels on the TV. She stopped flicking on the O.C and I was surprised to see Mischa (though have since realised that cable TV is abundant here as are American TV shows)  and asked her if she knew the programme. She shook her head and asked me what it was. I explained the gist of the programme though I didn´t really know that much about it, never having been a fan. She began to interrogate me on where I was from etc, when I replied that I was from England she looked up at me in awe and said ¨wow¨- no exaggeration needed, before quizzing me on every aspect of my life in England, gazing at me mouth open.

I made my next mistake of the evening, and admired her nails. Her face brightened ¨let me paint yours!¨she exlaimed and she looked so excited that I couldn´t say no.

I held out my hands, with my thoroguhly bitten nails and she asked me what colour I wanted. Feeling dejected and reasoning that my appearance couldn´t get much worse, I said she could choose. Purple it was. The same as hers, ¨like sisters¨, she commented. I grinned weakly and she beamed up at me.

She then proceeded to paint both my nails and fingers with a rather shaky hand, I watched for a bit but subsequently turned my attention to the OC until she´d finished. She eventually announced her handiwork was done and I looked down to what can only be described as a purple mess.

¨Gracias¨I said ¨eres un profesional¨ (what else could I do?!) She was grinning from ear to ear, evidently delighted. She turned to her mum who was getting her nails done (rather more professionally) to repeat what I´d said and her mother smiled at me appreciately. I had a feeling the girl would be boasting to all her friends that she´d painted an English girls nails for the next week.

My housemates hair was now cut, and while my nails were drying, she paid for both our haircuts, at least the butchering was free I suppose. We said goodbye and walked out into the night. I wondered if I could get away with  only going out in the night from now on. We took a taxi home, though had to change for another one on the way as someone went into the back of us. This night had been such a success: whiplash, butchered hair and ruined nails. I think the word car crash is definitely appropriate.

We eventually got home and my housemate handed me the nail varnish remover with a wry smile on her face. I thanked God nail varnish wasn´t permanent, and that hair grows back.

However, almost two months later  I have a bit of a problem. My fringe has indeed grown back and is currently blinding me, but I don´t know what to do! I do not wish for a repeat of my last experience but on the other hand am too attached to my fringe to grow it out, perhaps I´ll cut it myself. Could be interesting. Also in need of a leg wax but cannot imagine what horrors might await me in that department. I have a feeling I may return from South America a rather hairy girl.